We’re 99.99% Empty Space

Magic Lies in the Space Between

[Art: We All Live in Bubbles by Studio Irma; Music: Drifting Sands by JAde Wii]

I’ve been meditating for more than thirty years and teaching for a decade. But, until recently, I couldn’t stomach the Buddhist concept of interrelatedness (the idea that we’re all connected).  I mean, sure, this is true in theory. But if all the earth’s little beings don’t get on board with this concept and some (many?) act as if they believe the exact opposite, the believers get kinda squashed. Perhaps with a smile on their face, aglow with love for all humanity. But squashed nonetheless. So I’ve stuck with a basic paradigm of padding the space between, as if pretending to be disconnected somehow unplugged me from all interpersonal risk. 

Recently, I’ve had the epiphany that the Buddhists didn’t go nearly far enough. We’re not simply connected, like a long human chain. We’re enmeshed, linked, entangled. But because human perception is faulty, narrow, and survival-based, we simply can’t see this truth. Instead, we’re locked in a state of confusion.

It’s harder each day to determine the line between what’s real and what’s not. Is an AI essay, image, or deep-fake Drake real? With AI’s hallucinations and hallucitations (AI references to studies and journal articles that don’t actually exist), have we lost our capacity to determine what’s real? And how are we defining reality anyway?

If you’re willing to question your own conceptions and perceptions about separateness, come along for a ride into real reality. Into physics and psychedelics and Eastern philosophy. Into the very blurry line between me and you. Once you see the space between, your view of reality will expand. 

“We all know that Art is not truth. Art is a lie that makes us realize truth.”  

– Picasso 

This quote captures the essence of Picasso’s artistic vision and is the very reason why he remains one of the most renowned artists of all time. On a quick glance, we can dismiss many of his paintings as random geometric shapes. But that’s a lie. The truth he helps the viewer realize is staring us right in the face if we choose to linger longer, open our blinders, and crave the full picture. 

Random shapes morph into people and objects. An entire universe opens to us that we were previously blind to. Suddenly we see. Suddenly we realize the truth.

We can say the same for all aspects of perception. Perception is not truth. Human perception is narrow – it’s a smidge of what’s right there in front of us. The smidge our brain decides is important. 

Humans come equipped with standard algorithms for perception that reduce effort, increase efficiency, and focus on self-preservation.

When the brain’s exceptional pattern-matching machinery decides some stimuli (available information in the environment) is similar enough to something else in our storage banks, it neglects to alert us. We don’t even notice. 

And when it comes upon something strange and new, our vigilant brain will ping us – often unnecessarily flinging us into fight or flight. 

Algorithms are great, but they reduce our perceptive capacity.

Perhaps the most profound truth that humans fail to see is the interrelatedness of all things. 

If you’re like me, you’re a bit cynical when in ear-shot of phrases like, “we are all connected.” Sounds pretty woo-woo – and unactionable – on the surface. Even the butterfly effect seems trite – the idea that the flapping of a butterfly’s wings may cause disaster or glory half a world away. The theory suggests that small things can have outsized impacts on a complex system. If you’ve lived at all, you know that to be true, but so what? 

Well, if you think the idea that we’re all connected is a little far-fetched or meaningless, I’ve got really bad news. We are not all connected. It’s much worse…or better…or profound. 

In fact, we are all enmeshed and the butterfly effect is more real than anything you can perceive with your very own senses and sensibilities.

Join Me on a Journey

There’s a moment, a specific, startling moment, when the whole world blows apart. What once were people and objects and walls tear apart into fragments, as if Picasso reordered the universe through his minimalist, reductionistic lens. Form dissolves. Structure remains, though it doesn’t resemble realism at all. It’s impossible to determine where one thing begins and another one ends.

This is the moment, early in a ketamine journey, when I realize I’m no longer in Kansas and, in fact, that Kansas no longer exists. I can’t remember what my guide looks like, nor what I look like, nor what this room or any room looks like. In fact, the idea that any of these look like something loses all meaning.

This is the moment when I see things as they truly are. The atoms spread apart and I see the space between. I am the space between.

You see, we humans are 99.99% empty space. In fact, this is true of everything we see. It’s all made of atoms. And atoms are mostly empty space.

Suddenly, I’m able to see this negative space. 

Imagine a page’s white space – the background that we never even notice while reading – springing to life like it mattered. Like words and absence of words only exist in concert (which is true; there is no art without this principle.) That’s the truth I’m awakened to. 

Psychedelics – and all we see while journeying – is as much a lie as art. We cannot stay in that world we visit. It doesn’t actually exist. But, also like art, psychedelic journeys present a lie that reveals the truth.

Physics & Phenomenology

"Once we have bitten the quantum apple, our loss of innocence is permanent."

 - Ramamurti Shankar

Let’s get all sciency for a moment. Well, let's do science-light so my brain doesn’t melt. I’m not a physicist. I just play one in this essay. 

Everything in the universe – including us – is composed of matter, which is composed of atoms. Atoms are the living end. No really, they are. They can’t be created, subdivided, or destroyed. 

Most of the atom’s mass is concentrated in the positively charged, teensy weensy nucleus at its center. “How small is teensy weensy?” you ask. Nuclei are around 100,000 times smaller than the atoms they call home. That’s why there’s so much empty space. That’s why we are 99.99% empty space.

To wrap your mind around how much empty space we really are, we can call on the standard physicist’s sugar cube analogy: If we were to compress the entire human race – suck the space out of every single person – we would be reduced to the size of a single solid sugar cube. (By the way, that cube would still weigh the sum total of all of us, so don’t plan on moving that cube anywhere.)

I know you feel like a pretty substantive being. But…er…you’re not. And neither am I. 

But wait, there’s more. And here’s where things get truly hinky. 

The mighty but tiny nucleus of an atom is surrounded by negatively charged electrons that swirl around it in a cloud. So that empty space isn’t quite empty. I know, I know. My brain hurts, too. Some physicists refer to this as empty space. Others describe it as an electron cloud, where each electron has a probability of being there or not being there. You see,  particles can exist in multiple states simultaneously. 🧠 🤯

(Yes, people, this is science, even though it sounds like science fiction.) 

In classical physics – as in real life – we think of objects as being in one state at a time. For example, a light switch can be either on or off. But in the world of quantum physics, particles can exist in a combination of different states at once. 

When atoms come into close proximity, their electron clouds interact. So…When two people or objects approach each other, the atoms within their bodies can experience various interactions, which can then lead to electron cloud interactions. 

Your particles can be both here and there simultaneously. You can be you and you can be me. All at once. 

We are not connected. We are enmeshed.

How do we live in a world where all feels solid – where we know where all the dividing lines lie – if, in fact, nothing is solid at all?

Here’s what’s actually happening when something seems solid: Like particles repel and, when they do, they form a tiny cushion of static energy. So, the electron cloud that swirls around the nuclei of every atom, repels the electrons surrounding other atoms. That electromagnetic force supplies a kind of deepfake of solidity. 

I don’t know about you, but my perceptive abilities insist that the chair I'm sitting on is solid. I know that I’m sitting on this chair. But I am not actually sitting on this chair. I’m floating slightly above it. I’m just incapable of feeling that float, sensing that lack of separation. 

Bottom line: Everything we see is naught but a conglomeration of tiny particles separated by what is nearly infinite nothingness, strewn with atomic electron clouds that, in any given moment, may be either repelling or dancing with each other.

Untitled 

– Daniel Baylis

you are but a collection of atoms

working together

in temporary harmony

before being dispersed

back into the universe.

your earthly task is to help

those atoms

radiate.

imagine the simplicity;

you need not

achieve anything

but gently glow

What Would it Mean if There Really Is No Space Between?

“Having all the answers just means that you've been asking boring questions.” 

– Joey Comeau

The distinction between you and me is not as clear as we assume. As we perceive. In fact, where we draw those lines is a matter of beliefs more than reality. There’s an art to drawing lines. And art is a lie that obscures the truth before it reveals it.

I don't spend much time debating the physics of reality – even after all I’ve seen in my ketamine-induced parallel universe. 

How about you?

I wonder what would happen if we did. What would emerge if we questioned perceived reality as seriously as we consider the truest and best pizza slice (Chicago? Surely not! New York? Of course!)? What would emerge if we moved through the world acting as if the truth is apparent – that the dividing lines are porous, not solid? A field of excited, dancing energy particles rather than a rigid boundary. 

Let’s engage in a little thought experiment, shall we?

We’ve forgotten that we're all enmeshed. It’s possible that this is the root of all social problems. If we remembered this – felt it in our bones without question – our survival instincts would balloon to cover not just ourselves, not just our families, but everyone and everything. Basic instincts would support the well-being of all. 

If a forest was in danger, we would do anything to protect it. Immediately. No discussion. No politicized polemics. When there’s danger, our clever little brains would kick us into fight or flight. And we’d act as one.

And if you had something you needed to say – whether or not I agreed – I'd fight for your right to speak. Because your voice is actually mine. 

We can’t move through life entirely focused on the glory of electron fields and the depth of connection amongst all beings. We’d never get anything done. But when we sow the seeds of awareness in the back of our minds, we have a chance of seeing the fullness of reality more often, and acting on that awareness. 

Psychedelics showed me the space between atoms. But drugs aren’t needed to imagine what’s real. Knowledge and willingness are the keys. 

For so long, it didn’t matter how voraciously I studied this stuff. It was irrelevant that I could describe what was happening in the brain and in the body with scientific precision. The truth is that I saw the space between when I was ready. Psychedelics, physics, and phenomenology are all doorways you can choose to walk through en route to embracing interdependence. 

The space between has always been there and I’ve known the physics of it for a long time. Now, we’re partners in that knowledge. Welcome to my world!

Still, I find myself asking, “If this is nothing new…what magic is this? What magic is this that rewires my neurons in a way where all I can see is connection and belonging rather than separation and exclusion?” 

The space between isn’t magic. 

But it is. But it is. But it is.